Earth, Fire, Water

Month: October 2012

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The week’s lead up to the big firing was intense – the wood chopping on Monday, putting the horses on the fireboxes on Thursday and low pre-firing on Friday. So when Saturday morning dawned everyone was rearing to go. We have some fabulous photos and videos of the day and over the next couple of weeks I will be filtering through them for the exhibition on the 11th, a presentation to WSP members and for this blog and facebook pages. This takes a fair while as you can imagine so here’s a few photos to keep you happy till then!

Too many photos to download at the moment but all is coming together really well. The fireboxes are built, as are the fibre kilns; the wood has been cut (mammoth task!). Thursday 25th sees the horses installed on the fireboxes and the kilns assembled around them. Big, and fraught job. Friday 26th will be a candle firing to dry out the bricks and drive off and residual water in the clay. Saturday is the big day! Only 4 more sleeps to go. (PROVIDED THE WEATHER IS FABOURABLE. We can’t fire if the Westerly wind is too strong, or if it’s heavy rain. Will fire on the Sunday or the next weekend if we need to.)

Please ask your friends and family to ‘like’ the community hearth facebook page – once we get 30 ‘likes’, we get a short URL address (which makes it easier for people to find us on google) and also the ability to get statistical information about the page. Thanks.

Other people who have recently joined the team to learn about firebox and fibre kiln building are Bev McKenzie, Chris Fairley and Tanya. Rae Lye and Duncan Ryder have also helped out with the firebox building, kiln making and wood chopping.

08.10.12

Linda’s Filly made the move.

Sandra’s Pony Next

Oh my gosh, it feels so strange for this space to open up again after three months of occupation by the herd. All ready for the next creative project to come along.

Empty studio!

The horses’ temporary paddock at Lye Farm

Horses in Waiting

Everyone gathered at Elsa’s gorgeous studio (a converted Scout hall) 6km out of town. The making of the fibre kilns took two shots but they were finished this evening (8th October). Have a look at the posts Kiln and Firebox Discussions I,IIandIIIfor more details.

Lye Farm: the firing site in paddock just beyond cars; studio to the right.

Third fibre kiln finished!!!

We took a well earned break to dine and discuss plans for the next busy phase – brick cutting, firebox building, wood collecting, cutting and stacking, raffle fundraising at WSP Open Day on the 13th, horse set-up on kilns, and of course – FIRING DAY on the 27th!

The fibre kilns are completed!!

The least pleasant task of the project has been completed. Ceramic fibre is not very nice stuff – very much like fibreglass insulation bats. You need lots of protective clothing, gloves, masks and barrier cream to stop the small fibre hairs itching your skin.

However, with a process in place and protective clothing on, the task can be completed with relative ease. Especially if there is only one kiln to build. Bit tough having to do three!!

A couple of more people joined us at this stage to learn about the kiln and firebox building process – Bev McKenzie and Chris Fairly. The extra hands certainly came in handy. Big thanks also to Ray Lye for helping out with the spot welding. It is not normally needed, wire is fine for tying the walls together, but it helps with cost efficiency if you can get a kiln out of one sheet of reinforcing mesh – made possible by Ray welding stray bits together to make up a roof etc.

It took a couple of sessions, but we got there! Yay! And it felt like a major milestone had been achieved.

Size of the horses; this information helps with designing the size of the kilns and also with deciding which horses go into the kiln together. There will be two kilns with 3 horses in each, and one kiln with 2 horses.

The other decision factor is that some of the participants work full time, so their horses will need to be set up on the fireboxes on a day they can be there. Monday 22nd Oct is Labour Day holiday, so that works well for Linda, Mark and Lynnda.

That means on Thursday 25th, when we set up the next lot of horses in the kilns, Yvette, Sandra and myself will go in the second kiln, and Elsa and Yvette’s second horse will go in the small third kiln.

FIREBOXES

Elsa’s horse – 700L x 450D x 1200H

Linda’s horse 800L x 450W x 1220H

Lynnda’s filly: 580L x 400W x ?H

Mark’s horse: 760L x 470W x 1170H

Susan’s horse: 670L x 400W x 1200H

Kiln 1 will now be Linda, Mark and Lynnda; kiln 2 will be Susan, Sandra and Yvette